


The Dreamer

by 3pmthoughts



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: M/M, RPG, Video Game Mechanics, Zombie, dreamer - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-24
Updated: 2018-09-02
Packaged: 2019-06-15 15:14:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 11,712
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15415761
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/3pmthoughts/pseuds/3pmthoughts
Summary: Arthur, along with several users from different countries, was given the newly developed gaming device named Dreamer for a test period of one month. In this one month, Arthur has no choice but go along with the Dreamer's First-Hand-Experience system, and survive the game along with some very interesting people and a very annoying game programmer.





	1. A Slightly Different November

**Author's Note:**

> Hey guys, this is 3pm writing. 
> 
> I started this fic back on Fanfic net but decided to extend it here as well. So if you recognize this story... Worry not buddy, I'm in fact an old friend and not a content thief. For new readers... Welcome! This is one of my personal fav work I've written for USUK, so I hope you'll enjoy it as much as I do. Chapters will be updated biweekly until further notice o/

People love November.

It's the month right after Halloween and just before Christmas, a month where autumn and winter meets in the most enchanting way. From the chilly but not freezing weather all the way to the paths covered with golden fallen leaves, people love November.

Even in London, where November is known for its constant drizzle and early snow and people are known for complaining about the weather, they love November. As a novice teacher starting his first year of learning and teaching in a particular Elementary school in London, Arthur Kirkland too, loves November.

However, this year's November meant a little more to him than any other in the past, and he had been eagerly waiting for its arrival; along with the new game device he ordered. Little did he know that this November would mean a lot more to him in a long run.

Arthur had never thought of himself as a gamer. Sure he had played a few online games in his life, but never as intense as he thought a gamer would be. He had never thought of buying any game device either. As far as he was concerned, a laptop was more than enough to support his light gaming habits.

So to be precise, he was eagerly waiting for the new game device that his friend had asked him to test out, a device which his friend claimed would be an eye opener.

By the second day of November, the package containing the device had arrived at Arthur's house. Having signed all the forms and waved the deliveryman goodbye, Arthur immediately turned to examine the package. It was a box a little smaller than four regular shoe boxes stacked up together, and felt rather heavy in his arms. He shook it out of habit and heard some rustling sound inside. Then, grabbing a penknife, he opened it without hesitations, and dug a helmet-like device out of the box of Styrofoam pellets.

Arthur stared at the device in his hands as he flipped it about. The basic structure of the device resembled a fancy cyclist helmet, but other features like the eyepiece with a digital screen fixed on it and the several switches and plugs at both sides of the helmet gave Arthur the feeling that this wasn't any normal helmet.

Well he could understand that this probably wasn't a helmet, but the thought of this being a game device still felt weird to him.

Turning to his laptop, Arthur turned it on and switched to video chat straight away. As expected, his friend was already waiting for him.

"Good evening Arthur Kun." The person on the other end of the chat smiled politely at Arthur.

Arthur smiled his greeting. "Pulling an all-nighter again? It's four am in Japan now, right?"

The person, Kiku, smiled again. "I'm afraid so; such is the unfortunate life of a programmer."  
Arthur laughed.

"If it makes you feel any better, the life of a teacher in training is a sleepless one too."

"Ah, but rewarding, nonetheless?"

"To speak the truth, nothing is more rewarding than enough sleep." He joked, "Enough about jobs. I got your package. The… Helmet."

Kiku's tired eyes brightened at the mention of the helmet. "That is great news, I was a little worried that it wouldn't arrive on time. Have you tried it on?"

"Well… No, not yet." Arthur muttered, holding the helmet in his hands for a second round of evaluation. "How does this work anyway? Do I just wear it?"

Taking Arthur's questions down, Kiku spent some time explaining the basics of the helmet.  
"The helmet is a new gaming device that I have been working on. We named it the "Dreamer", and by wearing it, you obtain first-hand experience in the games that you are playing. When you first wear the Dreamer, some scanning and movement recognition will be carried out. After which, you will be free to begin your game."

First-hand experience he said…

"Is this device safe?"

"Hai. Even though the Dreamers are still in the Beta stage, they have passed all possible safety tests for such a device. It is absolutely safe." Kiku nodded rather confidently. "On a related note, I would like to thank you for agreeing to test the Dreamer out, Arthur Kun." He bowed.

"No need to thank me, we've been friends for a long time now, this is nothing. " Arthur smiled, waving dismissively at Kiku. "Rather, you mentioned that for better data collection, you decided to go for users from different countries right? Any luck?"

Kiku nodded, rather elated. "Thanks to the company, we have located one to two user in several major countries. However, due to the nature of the game program used, the users had to fulfill some basic criteria."

Arthur didn't know what Kiku meant by 'basic criteria', but seeing that he got the Dreamer, he probably fulfilled all of them. What bothered him, however, was the nature of the game program.

"So, what kind of game are we playing?"

"Since the Dreamer works on a different system, new games have to be specially made to suit this program." Kiku explained.

Arthur nodded; different devices need different game systems, he knew that much.

"The development of the game program was handled to a company in a different country. From what I've been told, a skilled programmer was 'enthusiastically working on it, and finished the whole system in less than two weeks'. In exchange for the satisfying work, he was recommended as the user in that country."

"So I'll meet him in the game? I'll meet you too, right?" Arthur knew nuts about a programmer's work and progress, but he guessed that creating a whole new game system in two weeks sounded pretty impressive. Just for that, he was interested in meeting this skilled programmer.

Kiku nodded once again.

"The game seems to be about surviving a zombie apocalypse."

…

Scratch that, he's going to avoid the skilled programmer in every way possible. A zombie apocalypse? Really?

"Location? Goal? Duration?" Arthur started his train of questions again while Kiku raced to catch them.

"The location seems to be in America, and as for the goal and duration, we can only be certain of it when we enter the game."

Arthur had started regretting his choice of helping test Dreamer now. It's not that it's troublesome or anything, but more due to the fact that the game of choice here wasn't of a genre or type that he fancied. Of course, he could not just back out now, not when the Dreamer was already with him. There's no other way, he's going to have to play the game.  
On the bright side, the beta period lasts only for a month, and he's only free to play games during weekends. In other words, he would only have to play the game for eight days max.

"Excuse me, Arthur Kun. I forgot to mention this, but for the convenience of the users, the Dreamer is built in a way that you can use it and rest at the same time. Hence, you can simply continue your game as you rest for the day."

Wow would you look at that, using it in your sleep, a literal Dreamer.

"So… You mean I have to play it every day?"

"If possible, that would be great."

"Can I at least start after I received the game card?"

"Arthur kun, the game card is included in the box along with Dreamer."

…

Well, that shattered the last bit of his hope.

People love November. It's a month of constant weather change and lovely scenery, a month with the most of Nature's magic at work.

Arthur loves November too, but he had a feeling that this particular November, things are going to be different for him.


	2. The Player's Room

Arthur had a considerably bad day at work today.

Sighing to himself, he locked the door to the simple three-rooms flat behind him and loosened his scarf. Having made a detour to his bedroom to set his things down, Arthur turned back to the kitchen to settle his dinner.

He accidentally dozed off while marking the students' work, and by the time he woke up, ten minutes had passed and there was a blanket on his shoulders. The female colleague sitting beside him simply smiled and said something about the others taking a nap on the job now and then too. He guessed that meant he wasn't in any serious trouble for slacking at work, but he did feel really guilty about it. He was paid to teach, not sleep in the air-conditioned staff room in the middle of the day.

"Maybe it was a bad idea to try and finish that stack of instructions in one night." Arthur muttered to himself, accompanied with yet another sigh.

He figured that if he was going to test the Dreamer, he better do a good job. So after his conversation with Kiku, he made himself a nice cup of tea and spent the night reading the unreasonably thick device instruction and game manual. By the time he was done, it was nearly two am and he only managed four hours of sleep before rushing to work.

Four hours was definitely not enough for what he had to deal with.

When the Grandfather's clock in the living room struck nine, Arthur kept the last plate in the shelf and turned to prepare for sleep. He was dead tired for one, and he did agree to meet Kiku in the game at this time. Since it's a weekend tomorrow, Arthur figured that he might as well sleep early.

Putting the Dreamer on, he adjusted himself in a comfortable position in bed, and closed his eyes. He dozed off almost immediately, remembering only the faint buzzing from the Dreamer.

When Arthur opened his eyes again, he was half floating in an empty space. In front of him was the projection of a digital screen, with words being constantly typed on it.

"Welcome dear player," He read. "To the survival game of a lifetime. "

He supposed the screen was right about something; to be able to experience a zombie apocalypse first hand, that's more than enough for one lifetime.

"A year ago, America was attacked by a disease that appeared out of the blue. The disease wiped out more than ninety eight percent of the American population. But instead of resting in peace, the diseased and deceased came back as what we call zombies. These zombies know little but to kill and to feed. And you, dear player, are their favorite food- This sounds very familiar."

Arthur paused the reading for a moment, wondering where he had read about something similar before. Then it hit him that things related to zombie apocalypse; be it movies or games or books, the all seem to have similar background story such as this one. He laughed to himself at the lack of creativity on the game programmer's part and continued reading.

"America's now abandoned by the world, and you are our only hope left. Summon your courage and depend on your wits. Locate the other survivors and work together to find the rumored cure hidden somewhere in this country. Best of Luck. America's future is in good hands."

The moment Arthur had finished reading the last sentence, a strong beam of light suddenly shot out from the screen and filled the space. Least damaging his sight, Arthur screwed his eyes shut and shielded himself from the light with his hands. Even so, the light was still too bright for comfort.

The lights finally died out after what felt like forever, and opening his eyes, he found himself in yet another place. It was a room this time, a little bigger than his bedroom. The room was poorly lit; the only source of light was from the cracks on the painted window fixed on one of the moldy walls. Arthur squinted, waiting for them to get used to the darkness as he fumbled around.

Judging from the ragged furniture in the room, he figured that this must be the player's bedroom; in other words, his bedroom in the game. The air in the room was rather stale but bearable, though he was a little disturbed by the faint scent of blood that was slowly reaching him.

Something's dead in this room.

While he panicked at the realization, his eyes finally adjusted to the darkness. Boy he wished he had not, for what he saw probably gave him more shock than a zombie ever could. The room was in a worse state than he thought: dirty clothes thrown all around, papers and magazine dating a few months back sprawled all over the damp ground. Several of them had photos of panic and death, and the headlines all spoke of the disease and zombie outbreak.

Empty bottles and cans piled up at a corner of the room, tattered food packaging was littered all over, and Arthur seriously couldn't find a single spot on the ground that he could consider moderately acceptable. All four walls of the room were heavy spray painted on. Judging from the colors, there had been several different layers of graffiti on them. The latest coat was in blood red, spelling words like "We're doomed" and "There's no hope".

Well, seemed like he wondered wrongly, this can't be his room. No way would he be that desperate, not even in a game scenario.

It was then when he noticed the source of the blood scent.

There, lying in a corner, was a dead rat the size of a small cat. He didn't know how that even made sense but there it was, lying on its back and bleeding from god knows where. The blood was still oozing out though, so the rat must have died a while ago. A blood trail led from the rat to the painted window, giving him some ideas about the death of the rat.  
Poor fella, dying in a place like this.

Arthur had a feeling that if he doesn't find a way out of here, he would be next.

…

Speak of which, he seemed to have forgotten about something.

"Oh, right. Kiku." Snapping his fingers together, he called the menu bar out and enabled the chat option. Immediately, a chat popped up.

"Hello Arthur Kun. How has the game been?" It was only voice chat, like a phone call. But Arthur figured that he would eventually meet Kiku in the game, and thought less of it.

"Hello Kiku. Sorry for being late. I was… stunned by my surrounding." He explained, smiling sheepishly even though Kiku couldn't see it.

"I see. If that's the case, I take it that you are still in the Player's room?"

… So this wreck of a place… Was really his room?

"Ah… Umm… I guess you can say so…"

"Arthur Kun, to officially start the game, you have to escape from your room. "

Escape the room? In a zombie survival game? What?

"Escape. From this room." He repeated doubtfully.

"Hai." Kiku replied with the least bit of hesitation.

"Right." Be that way. What was he expecting. "There's no door though…" Now that Kiku had mentioned it, he realized that the room was literally all four walls. Apart from the painted window, there's no other opening.

…

Window. Huh.

"Kiku, am I allowed to destroy things in this game?" He asked, scanning the room before picking up a wooden chair.

"Please feel free to do so. It's a first-hand experience game after all. Alfred Kun specifically made it that the player has a free range of choice and action. 'You can do anything as long as you can think of it! It's a flexible game about wits and courage!'… Was what he said."

Truth to be told, the only thing Arthur wanted to do now was to clean this mess up. He coughed.

"This Alfred… He sounds like a very noisy person." Arthur guessed that 'Alfred' was probably the name of that American game programmer.

Kiku chuckled softly. "It's best to know the person of subject by yourself to affirm your conclusions."

"Right, can't wait." Arthur rolled his eyes; predicting that his encounter with Alfred wouldn't be a peaceful one. "Well then. I'll be excusing myself now. Let's meet up soon." He stopped in front of the window and held the chair up.

"Hai. The area within five meter radius from the Player's room is the safe zone. So feel free to explore the place, or call me if you need assistance in any way. All the best, Arthur kun." With that, the chat closed with a soft beep.

"If I'm allowed to do whatever I want in this game," He grinned, and swung the chair at the window with all his might, smashing right through the thin glass. "Then this game might actually be worth my time."

A smashing entrance, check.

Arthur grinned contently at his work. The moment the window broke, rays of light and fresh air entered the room, bringing a brighter side out of the messy place. Not that it was a side Arthur would better appreciate though. The light only made more parts of the room visible; messy, dusty parts.

It was then when Arthur noticed something that wasn't there before.

Sitting in a corner just made visible by the light, was a metal baseball bat.

…

Arthur and the bat had a few moments of silent argument before he sighed in defeat and walked to pick it up.

He had expected the need for weapons in such games, but using a blunt baseball bat was still a little too much for him to accept. For one, he had never played baseball before. So to him, that bat might as well be a piece of glorified metal stick. Apart from blinding swinging that around, he had no idea what he could use it for.

"I swing it at their head…right?" Swinging the bat about to grasp the feel of it, he decided to make finding a better weapon his first objective.

He took a few more minutes examining the place for usable items, and apart from a lighter stained by a strange fluid that he refused to recognize, there was pretty much nothing left for him to take. Nodding to himself, he gave the room one last glance, and leapt out through the window.

"There should be a kitchen knife somewhere…" Staring at the few run down houses in the safe area, Arthur muttered. He's been cooking his own meals for as long as he could remember; a kitchen knife would definitely be better than this glorified piece of metal.


	3. The First Week

When Kiku finally met up with Arthur in the game, he was more than a little stunned to see the Brit slice a zombie's head off with what seemed like an ordinary kitchen knife.

Kitchen knife.

"Pardon me Arthur kun, but could it be that you cook regularly?" He asked after Arthur settled another zombie almost effortlessly. They have agreed on meeting up outside the city's library building since it's tall and easy to find. The zombies don't seem to gather much around here too, so it was considered a safe spot to meet up too.

"Oh, you can tell?" Slicing the last zombie up, Arthur swiped the remaining blood off his blade and walked back to Kiku. "I live alone, so I try to cook my own food if possible."

"I see. I tend to cook my own food once in a while, but I've never thought of battling with a kitchen knife." Kiku eyed the kitchen again.

Sensing the glance, Arthur smiled sheepishly and waved his kitchen knife a little. "I never thought I would be fighting with this either. But it's far better than the baseball bat I found; at least I've used a kitchen knife before. Speaking of which, what's your weapon?"

The two of them were immediately attacked by zombies the moment they met, but Arthur was the only one to take out his weapon and fight back. Kiku… Kiku was too stunned by Arthur's weapon that he simply stood watching.

"It's a katana, a traditional Japanese sword. I was lucky to find it in my player's room." He smiled, giving the katana at his waist a pat.

… Well, that certainly wasn't fair. Arthur sighed at the bat he found; no way that thing could beat a katana.

"…Anyway, the area should be safe for the time being, shall we start discussing on what to do next? This is a survival game, right?" Throwing the talk about weapons aside, Arthur asked as the two sat around a study table outside the library building. Electricity has long gone out in this part of the city, and the inside of the building was too dark to be considered safe.

Kiku nodded, taking the map out of his items tab. The game was made to be as realistic as possible, but some game functions such as the item tab and path indicator still made the players' job a lot easier.

"Due to time constraints and the fact that this game was simply made to test the validity of the Dreamer, the map covers a moderately small area. Small as it may be, the place should be more than enough for a good game experience." He explained, spreading the rolled up map on the rusting table.

The map was no doubt made of paper, and it would seem like just a normal map if not for that one flickering red dot on the paper. Arthur pointed at it.

"And… what's this?"

"That's the indicator, part of the map function. It pinpoints our current location, and will be able to mark out our path so far. Your map should have it to, Arthur Kun." Kiku pressed the red dot once, and simply watched as the dot stopped flickering, and grew into a line to mark his previous path.

Mimicking his actions, Arthur took his map out and marked his path as well. Comparing the two maps, it was clear that Kiku started his game in the gamer's room south of their current location, and Arthur's in the west. The library building itself was nearing the corner of the map, which meant that their best path would be north and east wards.

"Our current location is classified as a yellow zone. The zombies here can be handled with ease. As we move closer to the map's center, the locations will change from yellow to orange then to red. The very center is the black zone, where I believe is the most dangerous location."

"Don't tell me, our destination is the black zone." Arthur had seen enough movies to know where this was going.

"As expected from the observant teacher." Kiku smiled a little too brightly.

Arthur had a bad feeling about this. A very bad one. "We're not planning to just charge for it right? Kitchen knife and all, I don't think I'm ready to deal with any stronger zombies."

He heaved a sigh of relief when Kiku shook his head. "The game programmer would most definitely hope for us to do that,"

Screw the game programmer, Arthur thought.

"But we are going to take advantage of the safety here and better prepare ourselves before we move on. Our priority for the week would be stocking up food supplies, upgrading our weapons, and finding other players. We will move on to the Orange areas on the second week." He replied, using the red dot to mark out some places on the map: a few near the borders of the Orange areas, and a few near the edges of the map. One of them was particularly close to where they were.

Finding the plan reasonable, Arthur nodded in agreement.

Unlike real life scenario, they didn't have to carry a real bag with them and suffer from its weight. Instead, the items tab acted as a virtual bag capable of containing almost any object. Each item tab has 30 cells, so each player can carry up to 30 things. The same item can be stacked up on the same cell for at least 10 times, so overall, it should be more than enough.

Convenience aside, there's two addition to the game that Arthur couldn't quite agree with. The first would be the fact that they keep their real appearance in the game. Kiku explained that it was for a pinch of realness, but Arthur blamed it on the lazy game programmer who refused to build a character data bank.

The second would be that they could actually feel pain in the game. Who the hell thought that it was okay to add that in a survival game? They could be ambushed by a pack of zombies for all they know and they would actually die a painful death. Honestly now that's just ridiculous. Once again, Kiku insisted that it was crucial to include pain for a close-to-reality experience. Fortunately, to reduce stress put on the body, pain was reduced to a mere 10 percent, so the player can still get enough rest while playing the game.

Arthur thought that was… comforting enough.

"I've done some calculations yesterday to make searching for the other players easier. However, there seems to be a mistake in the calculation. Among the several locations found, only five of them pin points a player."

"But there's a lot more players than that, right?" Arthur sincerely hoped that the dot particularly close to them would bring them to one of the players. It's always better to move in a bigger group in this kind of situation.

Kiku nodded. "The search for players would be more effective if we split up, but given the situation, our chance of survival would be better if we move in a minimum group of two."

"Right. So let's check that dot first." Arthur pointed to the nearest dot, the one he's been staring at for quite a while now. For some reason, he had a feeling that approaching the dot would mean a lot of trouble…. "It's near the shopping area too. We might be able to find supplies or anything useful there. It won't be a wasted trip even if there isn't a player there."

"Affirmative. We will head there tomorrow. Arthur kun, it seems that you will have to wake up soon." Kiku smiled.

"Huh? But tomorrow's a weekend… Ah! The school sports day!" Coming to the realization, Arthur panicked a little and immediately called up the menu. "I'll see you tomorrow then Kiku, take care!" With that, he logged off.

"See you later, Arthur kun." He waved, smiling faintly. "Now then… to fix some bugs in the game."


	4. Easy Approach

Arthur had to admit that he wasn't a sports person, and waking up early on a weekend for the school's sports day wasn't exactly something he consider exciting, especially when he's just there for the attendance.

Well on the bright side he would rather be there just for the sake of being there instead of sweating like a sick dog under the hot sun chasing after a ball.

So sitting on a bench under the shade, he watched the kids play on the field and occasionally cheered his class on. All sports and fun aside, sports day to the teachers was really just another opportunity to show that his or her class is the best. It's rather childish, yes, but the feeling of other teachers staring at your class in awe was in its own way enjoyable.

... Well unfortunately, his class wasn't winning.

"It's okay class, we'll beat the rest in the final exams, won't we?" giving the nearest student a pat on the head, he encouraged at the end of the one sided game. His class, like him, was more brains than broad. It was usually something to be proud of almost everyday, but today just had to be the day where broad decides everything.

The class nodded, spirits lifted a little and smiles surfacing.

"Good. Now, you did a great job, so go get some rest and drink up. It's a hot day." He smiled, and with a rather messy nod, the class scattered off to the canteen.

Smiling to himself, he shook his head slightly and sat back down. He was about to take a sip of water when a teacher approached him.

"Do you mind if I sit here?" Pointing to the seat beside him, the female teacher asked.  
Looking up, Arthur was surprised to find the teacher extremely familiar. She wore a pair of red framed glasses, her head of shoulder length blonde hair tied into twin tails, but what really caught his eyes, were the pair of emerald green eyes, and that signature thicker-than-normal eyebrows.

"... Alice?" Before he could notice, he had already muttered the name.

The teacher smiled and sat down beside him. "Told you I'll find you again. "

So... She's really Alice? That bratty younger sister who went all the way to America for her studies? What's she doing in England again? What's she doing in his school?

"To be fair you've told a lot of lies." Arthur smiled. "So what are you doing here? You're not a teacher, are you?"

"Sure I am." She grinned, picking up the teacher's tag hanging around her neck and waving it a little. "Starting from today, I'm your class' history teacher."

"...History." Arthur repeated a strong pinch of doubt in his voice.

Alice nodded, almost beaming.

"You had a huge discussion with mum and dad, went all the way to America... to further your studies in History teaching." He could feel his left eye twitching.

"Well not really. I planned on learning about computer programming, but you know, circumstances." She shrugged. "Besides, shouldn't you be happy that I'm back? Now you won't have to live alone like the boring old man you're slowly becoming."

"I won't be becoming one any time soon. More importantly, what do you mean won't have to live alone." Arthur was starting to feel imminent danger.

"I called mum and dad and told them I'm back and will be working here, so they told me to come live with you, and make sure you take care of yourself... Oh and preferably show up for the next Christmas dinner with a girlfriend..."Her voice softened as she went on, making it almost inaudible nearing the end.

Arthur lifted a brow. "Show up with what?"

"Turkey. Stuffed turkey." She grinned. "Or just show up, they don't expect much after you isolated yourself for 3 years straight. All the older brothers are missing you too."  
He snorted.

"Missing a chance to throw me a punch or two, I assume."

Alice rolled her eyes. "When was honestly the last time you met them? They're all grown up. Scott already got a family! He probably won't try to beat you up anymore." She leaned in closer, grinning. "I heard his wife's given him a real lecture about his tempers."

"About time." He smiled, shaking his head again. "I'll think about going back, but for now, let me just confirm one thing. You've moving in? Staying with me?"

"Positive." She nodded, "Or is it too troublesome? Do you need a day or two to hide your inappropriate books?"

"Wha- I don't have any of those." And if he did, he won't just hide them, he would burn them to ashes before she move in. "I'm just thinking, if you're going to stay, I'll have to go shop for some household items."

"Oh, great." Alice couldn't remember the last time she's smiled so much. Among the brothers, Arthur was definitely the nicest one to get along. His porcupine personality aside, the guy's good-willed inside out.

"Well then how about we go shop after work? I don't know where you live anyway." She suggested, standing up and smoothing the creases on her skirt. "I still have things to settle, so I'll move in after a day or two."

Arthur sighed and nodded; the progression of things was just too fast for him to actually reject or stop it. He guessed he could need a hand with housework once in a while...  
"By the way, Alice." He voiced just as she was about to leave. "Why history?"

"Because you always have that pained expression when you help me with history homework. So I figured that one of us has to be good at it." With that, she left to say hi to the other teachers, leaving Arthur a little stunned and more than a little confused.

"What does that have to do with anything." Laughing to himself, he picked the bottle up and turned to go back to the teacher's office.

"Welcome home." He muttered, letting the words fade in the autumn wind.

Arthur's got a lot of things to say about the school's sports day, and at the top of the list, was why they had to organize it in the cold windy November.

 

* * *

 

 

"Arthur kun, has anything good happened today?" Kiku asked as the latter picked a dusty can of peas off the wrecked supermarket shelf.

"Hmm? Ah... That is one way to put it." registering the can to his items tab, Arthur smiled. The two of them have already ventured into the shopping area, and have agreed on scavenging for food in the nearby supermarket. Apart from the massive mess and layers of dust, Arthur would say that they weren't disappointed by the findings.

No sign of the player yet though... Maybe deeper into the shopping district.

"I see. You have been smiling more often today too. What may the good news be?" Kiku nodded, unsheathing his weapon and with a clean swipe, settled a zombie that suddenly appeared. As expected, they couldn't let their guard down as long as they were out of the safe area.

"My younger sister came back from America, she's staying with me."

"May I assume that you get along with your younger sister?"

"She's... Well she's not as stubborn and weird like most of my family." Arthur described, "In fact, you could say that she's the easiest to approach among my siblings. She likes to pick at people a lot, but not out of any ill will... I'll get her to say hi to you once she settled in."

"She sounds like a very cheerful and interesting person." Kiku smiled. "It will be a great pleasure to meet her."

"Oh, she use to study about computer programming, maybe you two can talk about that too."  
The two continued, chatting while occasionally picking a can of food up or slicing a zombie into two. And thus, none of them noticed the nearing footsteps...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A bridging chapter for now! Thank you guys for the support and message so far, I really appreciate it <3 Explosions are coming very soon for the plot, so please look forward to it!


	5. A new player

By the time Arthur and Kiku noticed something wrong, the floor was already rumbling, the lights hanging above them were shaking in sync, and the air was so stiff and heavy that they could actually feel it crushing down on them.

Arthur gulped and unsheathed his weapon, holding it tight in his hand. Seeing that this was nothing but a game, he had absolutely no reason to feel the tension and rising fear in his stomach. But here he was, actually breaking out cold sweat as the rumbling footstep became louder and more rapid at an alarming rate. It was coming from the main entrance.  
This was Arthur's first time cursing the fact that a game experience could be this goddamn real.

"Kiku I swear, I do not know what you've programmed into this thing, but I detest it already." Arthur shouted as the two gave up on their stance and turned to run.

Judging from the amount of noise and tremor made, whatever was coming at them was probably huge, and staying to fight would be a fool's choice.

"My utmost apologies Arthur Kun, but Alfred Kun did most of the programming." Kiku explained calmly as the two dashed down the aisles, heading for the super mart's exit. "If my guess is correct, we might have encountered a checkpoint boss."

"Don't say something that serious with such a calm face!" Arthur exclaimed, feeling his heart pound with both excitement and fear. "What do you mean checkpoint boss this is the bloody yellow zone! We're in a shopping mall! Who in the right mind would put a checkpoint in the shopping mall?"

"The program was completed in a short amount of time, so the chance of a bug might be-" The rest of Kiku's words were buried by a loud crash accompanied by a deafening roar. Arthur knew better than to look back, but humans just happened to be downright curious creatures that would dig their own grave just to catch a glimpse of how death looks like.

Long story short, he looked back, and regretted everything.

The thing chasing after them was a boss alright. It was at least twice the height as him, charging at them with bare strong legs while thrashing at everything with its four muscular arms. The boss, like every other zombie they've met so far, did not bother to grow any skin, hence freely exposing the pulsating mess of muscles and veins.

For a moment there, Arthur had the mental image of being chased by a raging piece of raw meat.

"This is bad this is very bad. Why did I agree to play this game?" He immediately spun around and shook his head in desperate attempt to get the image out of his head.

"Rest assured Arthur Kun, even among the bosses, the one located at the yellow zone is the weakest. With our current strength, defeating him is not impossible." Kiku reported and threw Arthur a reassuring smile. The latter had the urge to throw it right back at him.

"Okay, okay. How? That thing's at least 5 meters tall, and those muscles look way too strong. I doubt my kitchen knife can even scratch him!" Which reminded him; he really needed a new weapon.

Kiku simply smiled and nodded in the direction of the exit. "Keep running, as long as we're out of the supermarket, we will have a chance to fight back." Or rather, someone else would have the perfect chance to attack.

Confused as he was, Arthur nodded anyway and focused solely on running, occasionally avoiding the debris sent flying at them. The thing was gaining on them, but to Arthur's surprise, its running pattern was rushed and unclear. Instead of running smoothly down the aisle, which was definitely wide enough even for its size, the monster was blindly thrashing around and running into things, greatly affecting its speed. It was as if it couldn't see where it was going.

"Kiku! It's acting wei-"

"Keep running Arthur Kun. We're almost there." Kiku pointed forward, the exit already in sight.

"But-" Arthur threw another glance at the thing, this time focusing on its eyes. It was then when he noticed it; two shop signs stuck deep into the monster's bulging eyes. Ironically, one of the signs seemed to come from an eye care shop.

"Kiku! It's blind! It can't see us!" He shouted his discovery out to the figure running in front of him in a burst of both realization and confusion. "Why is it chasing us if it can't even see us!"

"The nose is all the sense it needs to sniff us out. The monster is as confused as we are, but it will not hesitate to hunt for anything alive. Our objective is to lure it out of the supermarket." Kiku shouted his reply among the noise, the exit was within reach.

"Lure it?! For what-" His words were rudely interrupted when a hand reached for him from outside the exit, and almost violent pulled him out of the place.

"For me." A new and energetic voice answered, full of pride and excitement. Arthur's eyes widened as he stumbled to recover from the sudden pull. Looking up, he met the eyes of the player.

A new player.

"He's all yours, Alfred Kun." Already standing beside them, Kiku smiled politely and gestured towards the monster, still crashing into things but obviously charging in their direction.

"Thanks dude! Didn't think that we would meet in this kind of situation, but beggars can't be choosers." The player, Alfred, laughed. "How about you grab your friend and dash out? This might get a little messy. I'll meet you guys outside Starbucks? I think I put it just opposite this building."

Kiku nodded, and with that, the energetic player waved his weapon—a chainsaw a little, before he ran for the thing head on.

It took Arthur 2 seconds to grasp the situation, and no time at all to get very mad.  
"You mean we lured it for him?!" Arthur growled, waving his clenched fist at the newly met player, who just passed off as rude and full of himself to Arthur. "We were his bait?! "

Kiku quickly pulled Arthur by the arm, and pointed down at the exit of the shopping mall. "Let's settle this later Arthur kun, this place won't last."

As if proving his point, the floor below them started rumbling almost violently. Taking the warning, Arthur swallowed his swearing and followed Kiku, dashing down the stairs and racing for the bright day beyond the exit.

Everything seemed to have concluded within seconds, and Arthur sat, panting on a rusting bench in front of said Starbucks while Kiku heaved a sigh of relief. The Japanese man wiped the beads of sweat away from his forehead with the back of his hand and turned to look at the building they've just escaped from.

Arthur followed. The mall never ceased rumbling from the moment they've starting escaping, but it seemed to have worsened, and things could be seen crumbling down through the mall's glass walls. Whatever's going on inside must be more than just hectic.

Then, when Arthur thought that the building was going to give way sooner or later, the rumbling stopped completely. An eerie silence dawned on them for a mere moment, allowing Arthur just enough time to wonder about what happened before blasts of explosion shocked him up from his seat.

He watched, jaw dropping at the sight as several explosions covered the building. Fire starting blazing, engulfing the collapsing building. With the blink of an eye, the mall that housed the supermarket was reduced to a pile of metal and rubble, crumbling in the ruthless flames.

To be honest, this was way too sudden for Arthur to understand.

What the hell just happened?

"As expected from Alfred kun." On the other hand, Kiku seemed to be very experienced with such situation. "Always ending the battle with a blast. "

In that moment, Arthur decided that Alfred will be the last player in this game he'll ever like.


	6. Morning Rush

Arthur woke up the next day, feeling both mentally and physically strained.

Dealing with a game that's almost like reality was more than enough, but now there's the guy who bombed a whole mall down just to kill a boss. As soon as the three of them met up, they took turns exchanging information while he resisted the urge to give Alfred a punch.  
From what he had understood, everything was a coincidence, and there was indeed a bug in the game. But aside from that, he was still clueless about a lot of things. Their discussion would have continued for a few more hours, if not for the fact that Alice called at nine in the morning.

"It's bloody nine in the morning this better be important." Was Arthur's first words as he answered the call, eyes half opened.

"It's not very important but I do need your help." Alice replied. Arthur could hear the sound of cheerful greeting in the noisy background, mixed with constant beeps and cranky trolleys.

"You're at the super mart?" Arthur asked; it was the only place he could think of with all those background noises.

"Yup. After that tour of your house yesterday, I figured that you can need a new chair or two. So…"

"Need someone to carry the stuff?"

"Real heavy stuff."

Arthur sighed.

"Okay. Why don't you go grab a cup of tea? I'll be down in twenty minutes. "

After he ended the call, Arthur sighed again and dragged himself to wash up and change out of his pajamas. It felt like dejavu to go down to the super mart again, but the knowledge that he won't be meeting any zombies this time made him feels a little better.

They have arranged to meet up at the café right beside the super mart, so by the twentieth minute, Arthur was already standing outside the entrance, looking in. It took him only one glance to spot Alice, who was idly reading the papers at a corner of the shop. A cup of tea sat on the small round table in front of her, and a large rectangular box sat on the ground beside her, taking up more space than the table.

…That's one big box.

He sighed another time for his bad luck, and walked in.

"They allowed you to bring this block in?" He asked as he approached her. The latter looked down at her watch before looking up at him.

"Twenty one minutes. Looks like someone's lost his absolute sense of timing." She smiled cheekily as she took one last sip of tea.

Arthur rolled his eyes. "I was one minute late because I needed one whole minute to figure out what could possibly need such a big box."

"Well I bought a bed, obviously. You only have one at home and I'm sure neither of us want the sofa." Alice pointed at the sign printed on the box. "I really was considering a chair too. But I figured you won't be able to carry both of them at the same time."

Arthur was going to mention delivery service when he decided that it was pointless. Turning out of the café, he came back a moment later with a trolley. The two of them loaded the box onto the trolley, and continued the irregular small chat as they walked home.

 

"So, how is the game so far?" Alice asked as she entered the house, plopping herself on the sofa. Since she studied programming, Arthur wasn't surprised when she squealed at the Dreamer, and spent an hour explaining everything to her. As of now, Arthur could safely assume that Alice was more interested in the game than he was.

"Confusing, I would say." Arthur replied, struggling as he pushed the box into the spare room. Having done so, he turned to join her at the sofa.

He started telling her what Alfred and Kiku told him, about how the blinded zombie ran away from Alfred and started chasing them instead, how Kiku figured things out just by observing the zombie's blinded eyes, and how Alfred wrecked the whole mall just to kill one zombie. Boss or not, an explosion was still too much in his opinion.

"My, sounds like a tough night." Alice commented after the story. "But it sure sounds exciting."

"Tell me that after you've personally experienced being chased by an oversized piece of raw meat." Arthur scoffed.

"I will probably never get the chance to." Alice laughed before changing into a more serious tone. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but what's a checkpoint boss doing in a mall? What zone is the mall in? "

"Yellow."

"Isn't that too unconventional? Be it the location or the zombie allocation. I would expect a zombie mob crowding the sales section in the mall. "

"They did mention a bug, but there's where I got utterly lost." Arthur replied honestly.

"No way! That's probably the most important part!" Alice exclaimed. "You have to try and understand that, it's going to be crucial for the development of the game play, I can feel it!"

"…From exactly what, are you feeling that from?" Arthur felt the tip of his mouth twitching.

"My programmer instinct! Now get back on the Dreamer and ask about it. I'll be right here in the living room so the moment you get it, come running and tell me about it. " She insisted, pushing Arthur into his bedroom.

"Wha- I'm not even sure if any of them is online right now! Besides, I told you I don't get it, it doesn't matter how many times I listen to the explanation!" Arthur rebutted, holding on to the door ledge for dear life.

"Then memorize it and repeat it to me! I'll translate it into layman's term for you! You won't try if you won't know!" With one last push, Alice won and Arthur stumbled into his room.

"I'm standing here until you put that on!" She demanded, standing at the door with arms folded.

"Geez, I get it. " Seeing the stance, Arthur admitted defeat and trudged to his bed, putting the Dreamer on with obvious hesitation.

He closed his eyes, and opened them again, immediately finding himself in the game world. To be more precise, in the player's room. The room had upgraded itself since he first entered the place. It was now cleaner, for one, and functioned as a holding room. Upon entering the game, he would be sent here, where he could either meet up with his team members, or continue from where he last logged out.

So far, his team member would consist of Kiku and the newly added Alfred.

Since he's only here to ask about the bug again, Arthur figured that he could just give Kiku a chat. As he was about to do that, however, a chat popped up instead. It was from Alfred.

"Hey, I thought you had to go off!" In came the prat's usual loud and energetic voice, accompanied by the clear American accent. Arthur rolled his eyes.

"I had to, but someone forced me back in here. To ask about the bug." He added after some thought. As much as Alfred annoys him in many ways, he was the one who programmed the game. Asking him might grant a better reply than asking Kiku.

"Oh… You didn't get Kiku's explanation?"

"Well, partly." Arthur shrugged. Not seeing Alfred in person actually made the conversation more bearable, he noticed.

"Kiku's offline though… Guess the hero will explain it to you then!"

… Never mind, the guy's just as annoying.

"Well then get on with it." He huffed, losing patience way too quickly.

"Alright, alright! Geez. Give me a sec, let me just- " Alfred paused, and Arthur could hear the mechanic sound of the chainsaw starting, followed by some audible swishing. "- There we go. Okay. What don't you understand?"

Arthur raised a brow; the idiot's still cutting zombies up at this hour?

"Everything." He replied without hesitation. "Just, explain everything again and save me the trouble of piecing things together myself. "

Arthur could hear Alfred stifle a laughter from the other end of the line.

"Okay, since you're not a programmer, I'll try to explain this in layman's term." Alfred replied, sounding rather happy.

On the other hand, Arthur wondered about where he's heard the reply before… Programmer instinct, eh?

"Well? Go ahead Mr. Programmer, or do you want me to grab a pen and note?"

"Was that supposed to be a joke? Cos it's-"

"Just start explaining."

And at a point in the future, Arthur would think back on this memory, and regret ever asking Alfred anything.


	7. Starter Kit

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Waaa... sorry about the lack of update, things got busy on my end and I forgot about it. So here's a back-to-back update for you lovely peeps. Pls leave me a comment if you've enjoyed the story so far!

"Okay, the dishes are done; I'm calling it a day." Walking out of the kitchen, Alice announced as she wiped her hands dry.

Arthur sat on the sofa with a book in his hand, and looked up to give her a nod. "Going out tomorrow?"

She nodded in reply. "Tea with the history department. A group of lovely ladies, all of them."

"If memory hasn't failed me, there should be at least one male history teacher in the school-"

"Oh, details." She waved a hand at him dismissively, the latter lifted a brow. "I'll come back by lunch, so let's go out and eat something good for health for once."

"Hey my cooking is fine." Arthur replied almost defensively.

"But it's my turn to cook tomorrow." She laughed. "Okay, it's settled then. All the best with your game." And with another wave, she turned into her room.

Arthur couldn't help but smile at Alice's quick arrangement, and sighed as he closed his book; so much on concentrating. It's ten on the clock, a little early, but he figured there's no harm. Standing up to off the lights, he turned in early.

It's been almost three days since Alice moved in, and time started moving a little faster than they would. The house got nosier, that's for sure, but he's not complaining. Aside from being a quirky younger sister, she also became his number one game guide. The girl knows almost everything, making Arthur wonder if becoming history teacher was really the right choice for her.

The game's been smooth so far; the three of them continued the plan to locate more players, and with Alfred's aid, clearing the path became a lot easier too. Today marked the last day of the first week, which meant that they would be marching into the orange zone by tomorrow.  
Arthur's not sure if he was ready. Well to be honest, his weapon was still a kitchen knife. In fact, that's one of the recent arguments he's had with Alfred, about why he would even have a kitchen knife in a survival game.

It's useful and all, but Arthur knew he would need something better if he's going to handle oversized raging ham at a regular basis.

Logging into the player's room, he equipped on the new clothes they found yesterday, and was a little satisfied that the fashion disaster gave him at least better defense against zombie bites. Alfred's no fashion designer, yes, but a hoodie with baggy pants was still too just too much.

He's never worn anything like that in his whole life. Well maybe except the ripped jeans in the teen age.

He was about to join the team when he realized that Kiku and Alfred had split up. Confused, he sent them his queries on the current situation. Kiku and Alfred are both developers of the game, so sometimes, it really felt like he's left out of a lot of things.

Not that he mind or anything. Really. Sometimes, ignorance is bliss.

"Hey Artie, a little early today, aren't you?" came the first reply of the day. Arthur had to resist the urge to just give up and log out.

"For the fifth time this week, it's Arthur." He stated word by word. "I have absolutely no idea where you came up with that nickname, but I quite like my current name. So let's please agree to stick with it."

"Okay then, how about 'caterpillar brows'? It captures the essence of your breath taking special feature too." Alfred joked. "You know I would still think it's a glitch in the graphics if Kiku didn't show me your photo. "

"He showed you what?" Arthur could feel the tip of his lips twitching and his temper rising at a steady rate.

"Your photo. All beta testers have their photo and profile. It's normal dude."

Oh. That photo.

"So you're telling me your poor excuse for a strand of hair is not a glitch?" He retorted briefly, refusing to take the eyebrow insult quietly. Even though judging from the prat's tone it was just a bad joke.

There was a gasp, as if he was offended. "Dude, my cowlick is awesome!"

"How does it even stand like that; it's defying gravity." Arthur argued. "Or do you cake it with hairspray every day? I need to warn you that hairspray induces hair fall."

"It does—I mean, no, it's normal." Alfred corrected himself right before straying from the topic.

Arthur gave a slight grin in success.

"Okay I don't know how to explain the gravity part, but its hundred percent r-"

"Alfred, we're here to talk about the game, remember?" Arthur reminded, putting a hand over his mouth to stifle his laughter. Boy he could just imagine the latter's reaction.

"Man you're not a very nice person, are you?"

"I prefer the term 'selectively polite'."

"...Anyway." Alfred replied after a slight pause, possibly due to a lack of smart retort. "While you were gone babysitt-"

"Teaching. I was teaching."

"—teaching the kids and educating the nation, Kiku and I received two distress signals, with a break of around thirty minutes in between. One's from the area north of where we last left off, and the second one is in the orange zone. Questions?"

"What distress signals?" Arthur asked, and took a seat on the only chair in the room; the one he used to bash the window. Fortunately, both the chair and window were upgraded as he played on. There's even an actual bed now. "We had a distress signal?"

"Of course we do, I designed the game after all." Alfred sounded unreasonably proud. "You can trigger it in many way. The most common one is to use the smoke bullet; zombies don't get access to that. Each player has three; it's included in their starter kit."

…

What.

"Wait. Hold it right there. What starter kit. I've been in this game for almost a week now and I've not stumbled upon a single starter kit." Arthur asked, both in frustration and confusion.

"… Have you tried looking under the carpet?"

"There's a carpet? Where?"

"I don't know man it's not my room. You have to look for it yourself."

"How are you even sure that I have a carpet in my room!"

"Every player has a carpet in the room you just gotta find it!"

"Wha- okay but a kit under the carpet? Really?" Arthur's not sure if he should classify this as brilliant game planning or just plain dumb. "Where's the common sense in this game, or is it as non-existent as the effect of gravity on your cow ear."

"Cowlick."

"We're not going back to that topic."

There was another pause, then what sounded like a deep breath.

"Okay. How about you invite me to the room, and we'll look for it? There's some pretty important stuff in the starter kit, so it's best you find it. Somehow."

After another 10 minutes of explaining how some extra functions work in the game, Alfred was finally able to enter Arthur's room. They spent the next twenty minutes arguing about everything possible as they combed the area for the carpet, only to find it hidden under the bed.

The bed. Arthur almost wanted to clap at the stupidity of things; who in his right mind would put a mat under the bed?

"Aright, next time I'm teaching you how to customize your room." Pushing the bed aside, Alfred sat on it with a sigh. He's tired alright, not physically from pushing the bed, but mentally from conversing with Arthur. This guy's definitely something alright. It's like they were taking turns to piss each other off.

"Is there really a need to? What do I even customize it with?" Arthur sat slumped on his chair, lifting a brow at the suggestion.

"I'm pretty sure I built at least one furniture shop somewhere on the map."

"But pushing a furniture home in the middle of a zombie apocalypse? I thought this game is supposed to be realistic."

"Dude it's a game, relax! It's realistic to give you the best experience, so that you know, you can enjoy it better? That's what games are for." Alfred sighed, and pointed to the carpet. "Okay, how about we get your starter kit first, and get on our way?"

"Right." Having finally agreed on one thing, Arthur went over and flipped the carpet open, revealing what seemed like a trapdoor fixed on the ground.

… Oh… So that's what he meant by checking under the carpet.

"See, I told you it's somewhere in the room." Alfred remarked smugly, having guessed what Arthur was thinking.

Ignoring that, Arthur pulled the door open to see a box hidden under. Bringing it out, he opened it and started checking the contents. It was a starter kit alright, aside from the mentioned smoke bullet, there's some canned food, a whistle, a torch, a pistol, and even an outdoor survival manual. Arthur wasn't sure if the last item was included as a cynical joke.  
But the pistol. Oh lord he could have been shooting the zombies down while standing three meters away instead of chopping them up and getting his hands dirty. Why didn't he find the kit earlier?

"If you're thinking of shooting everything down, you better think of something better." Reading Arthur's reaction towards the gun, Alfred advised.

"I wouldn't if I can get my hands on an actual weapon." Arthur threw him a glare. "I've played enough games to know the differences between a firearm and a melee weapon."

To Arthur's surprise, Arthur nodded in approval.

"That's great. Most players would go for the pistol, and I wouldn't think them wrong. But it's always best to rely on a melee if possible. The panic before the fall left firearm and ammos all over the place, but you know, an axe never runs out of kill power."

"Sounds like you're suggesting that I swap my kitchen knife for an axe." Arthur remarked.

Alfred simply shrugged. "Before you came, Kiku and I agreed on the new plan. He's going to check out the distress signal in the north. You're to join me in the orange zone."

Well, that would at least explain why kiku never answered the chat; Alfred probably told him there's no need to.

"Orange zone already?" Arthur's eyes widened a little. Even though he will be moving on to the orange zone tomorrow, it still felt a little overwhelming. He's not even sure how much more dangerous the new zone would be compared to their current one, and that very lack of information frightened him. It's still a game, yes. But the pain is real; reduced to a mere ten percent, but more than enough.

Alfred nodded, and gave Arthur a somewhat reassuring pat on the shoulder.

"Don't worry dude. You'll be fine. Even though this is a game, you only have one chance to live. So we calculated your chance of survival in the possible outcomes and stuck to the highest one. In other words, stick close to the hero, and you'll be fine."

That's a horrible way to stay alive… Arthur suddenly had this burning determination to become stronger. But he guessed it wasn't that bad to have someone do all the dirty work...  
"Fine. We'll stick to that idea." He agreed after some pondering.

The two sat down to further discuss their plan, and agreed to locate the distressed player before contacting Kiku. If the situation allows it, the two teams would meet up and camp in the orange zone for the second week to stock up on supplies and train for the next zone. According to Alfred, there's at least three checkpoints spread out across the zone, each guarded by a boss grade zombie.

Of course, to be honest, after seeing how Alfred took the first boss down, Arthur wasn't quite worried about the checkpoints.

"What about the bug?" He asked nearing the end of their discussion.

"We'll crush it if it crosses our path." Alfred replied, sounding serious and almost a little mad for once. "It went and messed up the system big times, so we're already losing players. Just yesterday, we lost our players from India and Monaco, and a lot more the few days before."

"Sounds like a lot of trouble."

"But doesn't that make the game more interesting? Now it's like a real survival game!" In a split second, all seriousness vanished, and Alfred's eyes were gleaming with excitement and anticipation.

... What was he thinking? How could someone like him ever be serious or mad at anything?

"Alright Artie, enough chatting," Alfred stood up, and offered the Brit a hand. "Time for some action!"

"Must be great to be an optimistic idiot." Arthur sighed as he held the American's hand and got to his feet. "But, for the sixth time, don't call me that."

This, was the start of a very, very wild ride.


	8. Shooting Practice

"Okay… Try that one." Alfred suggested, perched on the roof of a rundown building as he pointed down.

Arthur squatted beside him, following Alfred's guide and focused on a particular zombie among the few roaming about. This one was moving slightly faster than the others, and it's got a weird repeated action of covering its chest.

"Alright, spill it. What can that one do?" Knowing that Alfred wouldn't be so kind to give him an easy target, Arthur urged and nudged Alfred with his new found bow.

After locating the starter kit, the two entered the orange zone and raided a gym building. Aside from the unenjoyable encounter with the extra fit zombies, they looted a lot of supplies, ranging from medication to weapons. And among the load, were a bow and few quivers full of arrows.

Seeing that they couldn't possibly carry than many arrows with them, Alfred suggested that they train Arthur's shooting skills on the roof. Aside from the first misses, Arthur's managed to hit his targets so far.

"That's a screamer." Alfred grinned proudly, "Programmed this baby myself."

"Didn't you program everything yourself?" Arthur raised a brow.

"I had reference here and there. But this one's original from head to toe." He replied, sparks of excitement flickering in his eyes. "Go on, give it a try! It's real great."

"… I'll try after you tell me what it does." Arthur put his bow down, signaling for Alfred to explain the ability of the new enemy.

"Man you're no fun at all." Alfred pouted, and pointed at the zombie once again. "See it's chest? That's the only place you should aim for."

Arthur sighed; he figured as much. Why else would a zombie purposely protect its chest? It's not like their heart's working anymore. "What if I shoot anywhere else?"

"You'll agitate it, and it's gonna scream like there's no tomorrow."

…The name really gave it away.

"So what, we're going to need earmuffs?" Arthur joked, and picking his bow up, returned to his aiming stance. The screamer didn't move as much as the other zombies, but it covers its chest rather frequently, so he had to focus extra hard to shoot at the right moment.

He would have gotten the right moment if Alfred didn't suddenly pat him on the shoulder. Startled, he accidentally let go of the arrow, and watched it fly straight for the screamer's shoulder.

Damn… He accidentally tilted the bow.

"When a screamer screams, it draws all zombies from a 3 km radius to itself." Alfred leaned closer, looked down at the zombie, and grinned. "Good job Artie."

"I'm going to kill you." Arthur hissed and threw Alfred a glare. The prat did it on purpose. He deliberate did that just to show off the zombie's power. Arthur knew it, and couldn't help but feel his blood boil.

The screamer's high pitched scream filled the background, and Arthur couldn't believe what he saw.

Following the scream was the sound of shattering glass and car alarms scattered across the area. Zombies started falling out of the buildings, scrambling out of subway entrances, even crawling out of drains. Within seconds, the place was filled with them, agitated and thrashing about without a target. Staring down at them, Arthur turned to give Alfred a death stare, resisting the urge to just kick Alfred down to his doom.

They could have avoided all of these, but no, Alfred had to show off his precious child.

On the other hand, Alfred was completely ignorant of Arthur's glare. Instead, he was looking down at the hoard with pride and obvious excitement. He spent days trying to get the screamer's ability right, and seeing the result alive and in person could just be the best thing that could happen to any programmer. He would have enjoyed the scene for a longer moment if he didn't notice a significantly bigger figure shuffling among the crowd.

"Oookay, play time's over. Let's move." He suddenly stood up, startling Arthur a little.

"Huh-what's with the change of mood?" Arthur asked as Alfred pulled him up, then ran with him to collect the rest of the arrows. Sure he didn't like seeing Alfred all happy himself, admiring his work, but at least that meant they were safe.

"Uninvited guests. How well do you fend against spiders?" Alfred paused to turn and ask, the latter was too confused to even process the question.

"Wha-" Arthur's word was cut short when he felt the building tremble, followed by what sounded like rhythmic tapping.

That's not good. That's definitely not good.

"Oh well we had to move sooner or later, still got that distress signal to check." Alfred replied and ran to retrieve the emergency ladder from a corner of the roof. Arthur ran over and helped.

The two of them threw one end of the ladder over to the roof of a neighboring building, and started their escape. Unfortunately, ladders weren't exactly easy to use when put horizontally over the roof of two buildings. Arthur went first, and had to go on all four to proceed without falling.

Alfred followed closely behind, constantly looking back to check how much time they've got.

"Alfred what are we running fro-"

"Just keep moving Artie or we are both done for." Alfred urged, stopping Arthur's action of turning back. The latter sighed and continued moving, muttering about how they wouldn't be in this mess if Alfred wasn't such a show off.

The two quickly made their way across, and Alfred took no time throwing the ladder over. As the ladder fell into the sea of zombies, Arthur finally got back on two and turned around.

"For your information," He replied as he stared wide eyed at the enemy on the other roof. "I absolutely detest spiders."


End file.
